In Dreams
by Vee
Summary: What Luke started, Han and Leia must finish.
1. Default Chapter Title

I subscribe to the General Fanfic Disclaimer which you can find at swansongs.net/disclaimer.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Just a cute Han and Leia spec, tying in some knowledge we've gained from Ep. I. No real spoilers, though. I've always wondered how Leia would deal with her parentage, and how Han would react to it. I've read lots of good speculation, but I refuse to believe Leia could blindly hate or forgive anyone. I also don't believe Han would have such a careless attitude about the man who froze him in carbonite. I think that the general way for sentient beings to deal with unwelcome news is disbelief, mourning (of innocence or ignorance, usually), and -- gradually -- acceptance.

SUMMARY: What Luke started, Han and Leia must finish. A journey of all sorts follows in ridding the galaxy of Darth Vader.

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Han Solo tapped at the familiar black armor gently with a fallen twig. Aside from being covered and filled with ashes, it was virtually the same. The helmet and mask rolled off the pyre and crumbled into black powder.   
So this is how things went.   
And with a sigh, he collected himself and stepped forward to inspect the body. Not Darth Vader, but a body, dead as dead. Dead as he would be someday. He felt more sorry for it than anything else.   
Beneath where the fearsome plasteel mask had been, charred breathing apparati and a vocoder lay unmoved from where they had been for nearly as far back as Solo's memory went. A vocoder? He could hardly keep himself from laughing in shock. Somehow he'd always assumed that powerful, trademark voice was Vader's own.   
Why, if that wasn't Vader, what was?   
Struggling slightly, he plucked it from its resting place and shook it out over the armor, held it up to his eye. Didn't look damaged to him. But, he supposed, the second-in-command of the Empire could have had the resources to have everything indestructible but his own body. He turned it over in his hand a few times, then placed it along with the food rations and other survival items in a compartment on his belt.   
That damn Luke, he thought. What the hell has he done?   
Han pulled a few rocks from the outer edge of the pyre and placed them over the empty shell. Section by section, Darth Vader disappeared.   
He took a moment to steel himself, then headed back to the Ewok village. The sanctuary moon was dying, and what had to be done almost didn't *have* to be done.   
Death everywhere. But still, in the distance, Han Solo could still hear the sound of jubilation.

"Leia."   
Han's voice was warm, soft ... she drifted from a black, dreamless sleep slowly. It was only Han, not yet another Ewok, not a pilot. She couldn't help but smile.   
"We've got to go."   
She knitted her eyebrows in confusion. Go? He had just left.   
"What did Luke want?"   
"He's going to be in trouble if we don't go, Princess."   
Okay, this was serious. She crawled out of her hut and came to a standing position on the bridge outside. They walked for what seemed to her like an eternity before finally she spoke up.   
"What do you mean, trouble?"   
Han stopped and pulled the vocoder out for her to see. "All that's left of Vader is a pile of black plasteel dust and *this*."   
Leia watched, frozen, as Han put the vocoder back. If that was supposed to wake her up, it certainly worked.   
"The celebration's over, Princess. Luke did what he had to do and now two governments are going to go after him. One for desertion--"   
"And the other for murder," Leia finished. They continued. "He killed him?" Her tone was incredulous. Without any more words, it was understood who she meant.   
"I guess," Han sighed. "But he brought him here, to this moon, and there's an Imperial shuttle. Questions are going to be asked."   
"Vader's shuttle," Leia realized. "You can't seriously be planning on getting rid of it?"   
Han turned back to eye her strangely, then continued on, pushing away some brush over the path. "Well, what are we supposed to do, hand it over to Mon Mothma? Where did we get it? Then we have to tell her that Luke left, and the rest of the story, and we destroy the Jedi again."   
Leia grinned. "I thought you didn't believe in the Force."   
Han shrugged. "I don't think I do, but does it hurt to have a guy around who can swing a lightsaber? Besides, he's your brother. He's family."   
"You're right," she agreed, fighting to keep up with Han's obsessed stride. "Except for one thing."   
"What?" Surely not the brother part. That was the best thing that had happened to him since Jabba's palace.   
"I don't think we *could* tell her the rest of the story, even if we tried."   
Images of black, powdered plasteel filled his mind.   
"I agree with you there." He pulled back another branch to reveal their destination. "Where to, Your Highness?"   
"I don't know," she replied, her voice distant. "We'll figure it out."   
Tentatively, they climbed the ramp and soon disappeared into space among the shrapnel and bones of the second Death Star.

He loved her.   
He couldn't stop himself from thinking it, just as he couldn't stop his eyes from following her fingers as she braided her hair into a halo around her head, a few loose, long, wavy tendrils flowing behind. She sat in a corner, afraid to sit anywhere the Dark Lord might have touched. Han, however, did not plan on spending an entire trip standing or on the floor, so he willingly took domain over a couch.   
How many other men had loved women the way he loved her? He didn't want to think anyone could, but the idea was ridiculous. There were too many people in the galaxy for that.   
How many other men had thought that? And how many more would think it? Would he have a son that loved a woman like that? Would he have a daughter to be loved like that? Would she be as brave and daring and beautiful as her mother?   
Was it all the same story hidden behind other names and positions and credits?   
She had a brother, and he was not an Organa. Before, the name Leia Skywalker scared him, but now it made Solo stare into the stars and wonder. The people closest to him -- well, not counting Chewie, of course -- were siblings? Twins? They hadn't been raised similarly at all, not at all, but he'd be damned before he'd say they weren't the bravest, most honorable, most trustworthy people. And that's where the real question lay, in the parents neither remembered.   
For the first time in five years, Solo wished that old fossil Kenobi were still alive. The disappointment had been written all over   
Leia's face when she told him she didn't know her father, didn't really remember her mother. Kenobi seemed to know more than he was letting on.   
Leia continued to stare at the walls, as if they held some sort of answer to the questions she couldn't bring herself to ask. She had long since stopped braiding.   
"You okay?" he offered, wondering if she had read his mind, if she'd always had some Jedi abilities.   
She sighed. "I'm just tired."   
He almost suggested she find somewhere on the shuttle to rest, but he bit his lip before the words could leave his mouth. The idea of anyone sleeping in Vader's bed was enough to make him vomit, much less Leia. He flashed a warm smile at her.   
She continued to let her eyes wander around, bouncing from Han, to a wall, to the control panel. To a door, that inevitably led down a corridor that neither of them wanted to traverse. And where would that lead? To more pain? Or to happiness?   
Darth Vader was dead. Her father was dead, dead, dead, dead, dead. She would have died herself to see that happen a few days before. Now, she wasn't so sure -- good in him? Good in the man who held her back from ripping Tarkin's face off when surely he deserved it? Good in the man who knowingly amputated his own son's hand? Who froze Han in carbonite?   
What possessed Luke to bring his victim's body to a proper burial, besides a streak of insanity that had so far proved hereditary? What made Darth Vader deserve cremation after what he'd done? If disposal by explosion was good enough for Bail Organa --   
But it was daunting, because if it was hereditary, it could be her next. She fixed her eyes away from the door.   
She thought about the ponds she'd played in as a child, how she always pretended they were shored by a traditional sand beach. How Luke had grown up in a vast beach and had probably longed for a pond.   
And then, she wandered into sleep.

Han, however, fought off the sleep and fell into a paranoid wakefulness, thoughts bouncing off one side of his skull to the other as frantically as they were borne.   
He stared at one particular green orb with intense jealousy, as it grew in size, and then was immeasurable and immense, then grew tiny in sight. Naboo.   
What sort of name for a planet was that, anyway?   
He knew that's where Luke was, didn't know why, really. Luke just said his father told him to go there.   
Wasn't Luke's dad dead?   
One of those Jedi things, Han guessed. Luke's father, Leia's father -- did they really even have a *mother*? Or was that another Jedi thing? Did Jedi Knights have to pull children out of their asses because of that "there is no passion" clause of the Code?   
That would be the only foreseeable way for Luke to ever have children, he smirked to himself, if he didn't drop that stupid Code like a bad spice shipment.   
Leia, however, was a different story altogether. Sleep didn't sound so bad, if he could wrangle up a dream about her and her defiance of her Jedi blood. Except for maybe levitation.   
He went off in search of a blanket.   
And maybe a pillow.

"Hello."   
There was no question of 'who are you' from this child, or 'where am I' from Leia. She was sitting in a shop, on a counter. Various mechanical parts here and there, a sandy floor below her feet and adobe walls and ceiling crowning the space. The blond, towheaded boy was all smiles as he sat next to her, a calm transcending the room unlike she'd ever felt before. Outside, she knew there was a city, but it was a very quiet one.   
For a moment, she wanted a mirror to see if she too were a child, because he looked very much as she'd always pictured Luke to have looked, right down to the Tatooine dress he'd worn when she was 'rescued' from the Death Star. But one look down quelled that.   
She grinned at him. "Hello to you, too."   
He raised an eyebrow at her. "You're very beautiful."   
She laughed. Maybe Luke had a fling when he was younger, maybe some things *were* genetic ... like insanity ... . "You're not so bad yourself."   
"Do you want me to show you around, or do you want me to just compliment you?" he asked, not derogatorily, actually seriously.   
"If I can't have both," she sighed playfully, "you'd better show me around."   
He held one small, sandy hand out to her, and she wrapped her much larger hand around it, thinking of what snide remark Han would have to say about this.   
"Where *is* Han?" she asked the boy as he led her out the door and into the sweltering street, surprised at how detached she was from what she usually would have felt with such a memory loss. Panic. Fear. All other things. But gradually, things became less surreal and vague and more material. Instead of feeling like she was floating along, she felt her legs pushing against the sand. Instead of feeling disconnected, she could feel the grit and grime transferring itself to her hand.   
"Captain Solo is still aboard the shuttle."   
"Oh." She looked around, absorbing the sights and sounds of the city. Mos Espa, the words filled her mind very suddenly. So this *was* Tatooine. "Are you taking me to him?"   
"You have to do that, Leia," the child replied, very seriously, and began pulling her along. He broke into a run, and then into laughter. "*We're* going home."   
"You know my name! That's not fair!" she laughed. "I don't know who you are!"   
He whipped his head back as they weaved through a steadily growing crowd. "My friends called me Ani," he replied.   
"Called? What do they call you now?"   
"I have no friends," he stated. No questions, no regrets at all, just the simple truth. Just Leia and Ani.   
"Home?"   
They continued on wordlessly, fighting the streets of this city. Mos Espa.   
A thought not her own crawled its way into her brain, synapse by tiny synapse, just a flash of a wince, after she noticed her young companion had referred to Han as a captain and not a general.


	2. Default Chapter Title

I subscribe to the General Fanfic Disclaimer which you can find at swansongs.net/disclaimer.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Once destined to be just a cute Han and Leia spec, tying in some knowledge we've gained from Ep. I. Now something else. I've fleshed out the Luke subplot more, and that's added a whole new dimension to the thing. Aw, hell, I have other things I should be writing. Anyone wanna take this over? Say it in the reviews section, leave your e-mail, and I'll tell ya where I was going.

REFERENCES: to MJ Mink's "The Long Road Home," which can be found at http://members.xoom.com/LynM/; a fabled planet called Sith. A slight reference to FernWithy's Encounters/Father's Heart series; Naboo being an Imperial prison-world (the speeder-bike thing was more from ROTJ).

SUMMARY: The palace at Theed, some holovids, and the Jedi Council. Bad words, but I wrote 'em and I'm 17.

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The majestic halls loomed over Luke Skywalker's head, ill-lit and full of dusty air.   
What could possibly be here? Password, his ass.   
Naboo, it turned out, was an Imperial prison-world. He'd always thought it a fable, just as Sith was a fable. There was no magical planet, Sith was just a Force sect -- so why wouldn't Naboo, the Emperor's homeworld, be just as fictional? And why would his father want him here?   
The streets had been deserted and fearful, full of Imperials scattering beneath the woodwork like scorpions on the sand, with the occasional crazed prisoner running rampant in the middle of the street.   
Would his life's work be to correct the mistakes his father had made?   
Was the password a prisoner-release code?   
Or maybe, Anakin was still Vader and this was some weapons code and he was going to unleash terror from beyond the grave. What a cruel, cruel thing to do; you'd think someone who was dead would not wish it on anyone else, Dark Side or not.   
Maybe it was a bank account password? The Alliance paid so poorly, after all.   
The palace at Theed was the safest place to be. It seemed that no-one dared to enter it. Had it been one of the Emperor's residences? he asked the Force, but of course he received no response, other than the realization that the people outside did not avoid it out of fear, but of reverence. Nobody really respected Palpatine; it couldn't be his ... and everyone knew Vader lived on the Executor. Well, *he* knew.   
There was still an eerily-familiar feeling to the the entire thing, as there had been on Dagobah.   
He was drawn to the walls, and Artoo followed him, beeping happily. Paintings, etchings, sculptures, and other sentimental regal baubles lined the other wall; he stood before the wall which was a standing timeline of monarchs and their spouses, imaging so clear that one felt as if they were right before you, hundreds of people from different times. So many ... and as he came to the second-to-last, end-dated fourteen years before Luke's birth, there was a King Veruna -- or, as the placard below the image truly read, "Adlai Ennefi, King Veruna" -- and below him the names of those in the image with him. The last, end-dated in the same year he was born, a young *girl*, really, no older than he was now ... .   
His eyes caught hold of the name on her placard.   
Padmé Naberrie *Skywalker*, Queen Amidala? That meant her even-younger husband was--   
No.   
They were so *young*, it was so unfair, Anakin had appeared to be *ages* older when unmasked!   
Was he sent here to realize that it didn't take age to fall into evil?   
(Maybe it opened his mother's bank accounts.)   
Say the image before him was of his father at nineteen years of age. Most of the images were of old men and women, very few were young, so one got the impression that these were recent images -- say the image was only as old as Luke, twenty-two years! He suddenly felt robbed; had things gone differently, his parents would have had years left, decades. He began to wallow into his grief, for the first time since he found the truth, really mourning what he'd never had.   
Artoo warbled suddenly to warn him, but it was too late. He felt the business-end of a blaster pushed square into the base of his neck.   
Shouldn't have let my guard down, he thought to himself.   
"Who are you?" the person, a man, asked. "How did you get in here?"   
"I'm Luke," he said, his voice more bitter than it should have been. "I walked in. You?"   
The man spun him around. "Luke *Skywalker*?" Stunned, Luke nodded. The dark-skinned, near-elderly man flung his arms about him. "Your Highness! I never thought you would return!" He pulled back, realizing what he'd done. "I'm sorry ... I'm General Panaka. I served under your mother -- well, I still do, but considering current circumstances--"   
"What do you mean, you still do? Current circumstances?"   
The older man was taken aback. "That is why you returned, isn't it? Pray I didn't say too much! -- how much do you *know*?"   
"I know enough." That wasn't really true, not deep down. "I know who my parents are" -- Now, he thought -- "and I know who my father became."   
"But you don't know about the Queen."   
Luke pointed to the placard beneath her image in the Hall. "Padmé Naberrie Skywalker," he repeated, deadpan.   
"No!" It seemed that madness had crept into the general's eyes; his voice dropped below a whisper. "She's alive, in carbonite ... I thought maybe you knew the password."   
It took a moment for Luke to remember to breathe.   
  
Leia and Ani stopped at a hovel's door.   
"Are you ready to go inside?" the child inquired, suddenly seeming serious.   
"Why would I not be?" Leia felt serious too, but not so alone as she usually did upon feeling serious. She was not alone. Ani was there, and on the other side of the door--   
It slid open, and she let go of her guide's hand and stepped ahead of him, into the darkness.   
Talk about deceiving appearances.   
She stood in a grand circular room. It was in need of cleaning, and most of its light was natural (which would be beautiful, she was certain, save for an encumbering greyness which filled the sky and dimmed the room); beyond the windows, Imperial machinations floated about haphazardly. A bluish glow began to overtake the streams of dust in the air, and it shaped itself into many, many separate, smiling entities. She recognized some without knowing exactly how: Mace Windu, whom Bail Organa had told her was the head of the Jedi Council; Yoda, whom Luke had spoken of; and -- how it was possible she recognized him, she was not yet certain -- a young Obi-Wan Kenobi. It was the Jedi Temple on Coruscant -- but how? It was long destroyed -- surely this was impossible! And more than that, how did she get from *Tatooine* to *Coruscant*?   
"What ... ?" she began, and turned around to find Ani, to see if the boy was seeing the same things she saw.   
There was no boy behind her. In his stead there was a young man dressed as Kenobi had been dressed when he died, who seemed vaguely familiar, who loomed over her in height (and, of late, in her mind). He sort of looked like Luke ... something clicked.

There were absolutely no blankets, nor any pillows aboard the shuttle. No creature comforts at all. It seemed that the shuttle was stark and cold as the space without. Han kicked an empty panel in frustration, only to jump back when the panel kicked back, and out, to reveal a pile of holovids.   
He secretly wondered if they were the sort that he had spent some time shipping around the Outer Rim, but winced at the thought when he realized just who would have been watching them. Carefully, he took one out, pressed the button --   
"I came inside to get away from recorders, Anakin," a female voice admonished playfully, then the image came into focus, just above her head. Han whistled low and long. This girl was beautiful -- wait. Anakin? Hadn't he heard that name before?   
On the Falcon, when he first met Luke. It had been Kenobi who had said that name. The person who had recorded this was The Father of Luke and Leia? Then why did Vader have it?   
Could that have been his bargaining point with Luke: join me, and I'll give you the knowledge about your father that you've been longing for? An odd pact to make with the murderer of one's father, but Luke had always been so blindly admiring.   
That must mean the girl was their mother! She was famous -- her words alone gave that way -- but Han dimly recalled seeing her on the holonews. Their mother was famous! Surely someone else would recognize her, upon seeing her, when they returned, and then Luke would finally know everything. It seemed his dead Jedi friends never gave him anything beyond commands.   
The Father laughed. He was a kid, Han could tell just by the way he laughed. "How does it feel knowing you're going to be Mrs. Jedi Knight Skywalker?"   
"That's Padawan Skywalker--"   
"I'll be a Knight someday--"   
"--And *I'm* not going to be *Mrs.* anything. *You're* going to be Mr. Queen Amidala."   
Queen Amidala?   
The Father's voice, while not completely sombre, became less light. "Oh, right, the big scandal -- the queen and the slave." Like mother like daughter, Han thought. The princess and the smuggler.   
Amidala bit her oddly-painted lip. "Ani, I didn't mean it like that."   
"I know."   
"If it doesn't matter to me, why does it trouble you so much?" She paused. "And really, turn that thing off. I feel like I'm talking to a mask."   
"Someday, you'll thank me for being such a faithful archivist."   
"No, I won't. Force forbid we ever have a child -- you'd chase the poor thing 'round the galaxy with that stupid thing."   
The Father turned the recorder on himself, holding it at arm's length. He was practically Luke, only much taller, whereas Amidala was Leia. "Note to self: do not chase child if child becomes family disgrace and breaks Republic law. It will give Padmé 'I-told-you-so' rights."   
The discussion was getting boring. He flipped to another, toward the bottom of the stack, and activated it.   
It was a newsreel, nearly as old as Han himself.   
Again Amidala was on the screen, along with a young Kenobi (the holovid identified him as such) and a blond kid (identified as The Father -- well, Anakin). It told of the reemergence of the Sith, showed the kid shaking hands with Palpatine, talked of some Jinn guy getting killed. Then that the elder -- younger -- Skywalker was going to be Kenobi's apprentice--   
Shit.   
Hadn't Vader been Kenobi's apprentice?   
SHIT!   
"Shit!" Han yelled, throwing the holovid against the wall violently. This explained every last fucking second of the past four years! "Fuck!" -- this is why he was frozen in carbonite at Cloud City -- "Damn it!" -- this is why Luke only had one hand -- "Son of a bitch!" -- this is why Leia was bawling on Endor, this is why she's so out of it, this is why Luke brought him back!   
"No-one planned on telling me!"   
The questions taunted him: how long had Luke known? How long had they both planned on knowing before telling him? How far into this mess was he, really?   
Before he realized what he was doing, he was back in the cockpit, shaking his soon-to-be bondmate awake.

"You!" she spat. *Captain* Solo? Friends *called* him Ani? "Ani, *Anakin*, how could I not see it? Why did you keep me from seeing it?!" It was one thing for fate to have linked them together in a random pattern, but it was another thing altogether for him to use the same sorcery he used to snap necks and murder innocents in order to contact a daughter that had no desire to claim him!   
How did he stand before her? Her mind was racing frantically for explanation.   
"Am I dead?" she whispered. "Is this the Force?" A pause. "Why am I stuck with *you*?"   
"So many questions."   
The emotion, which had been thus far suppressed from without, was now springing forth from within. Her teeth clenched together and she shook with tears. "So few answers."   
He smiled -- how she hated that he could smile -- but it was a disarming sort of smile. She had trouble imagining the mask, the helmet, the ridiculous costume which was Vader. How did someone change like this? He began to walk to the windows, their grand scale dwarfing even him. She followed, a strategy she'd always considered manipulative and intimidating in politics, but which she feared was exactly what was wanted here.   
"You are not dead. In fact, you are fully alive. And no, this is not the Force. You are Force-sensitive, and we are reaching to you *through* the Force."   
"We?"   
"These are not merely apparitions." He motioned toward the other Jedi. "These are the people who died to hide you from me."   
Her eyes swept across what seemed to be a sea of people, of numerous species and races.   
"Allow yourself to be trained, young Skywalker--" Windu began.   
"Don't call me that!"   
"--Okay, *Leia*." Windu lifted his eyes to Anakin as if in apology. Then, to Leia: "Do not let us have gone in vain! We could just as easily have left you and your brother to the Empire's devices and joined the Rebellion outright, but we believed the Force had another path in mind -- we believed in the prophecy. It has been fulfilled."   
"Balanced, the Force has been," Yoda added.   
"What prophecy are you talking about?" she replied indignantly.   
Another figure, a tall man with long, flowing hair, stepped forth. "The Prophecy of the Chosen One. The One who would balance the Force both externally and internally."   
"You're speaking in riddles, old man," Anakin sighed. She would soon figure out she was asleep, and awake incensed and unreceptive to the Force, and then all of his sacrifices, all of their sacrifices, all of Padmé's sacrifices would be rendered worthless, unless someone told her the story.   
Kenobi saw this and moved forward. "It's called a 'certain point of view,' actually," he said, smiling. "From the point of view of a skeptic, such as yourself," -- Leia frowned -- "it would seem like riddles. From the point of view of someone who is untrained in the Force -- that's you again -- it sounds like nonsense. So let me just say this: at one time, there were ten-thousand Jedi and two Sith. Now, there's no Sith and one Jedi. Your father balanced the Force externally by reducing the number of Force-users to make the ranks equal. He balanced it internally by making it possible to return from the Dark into the Light. And now, the power of the Force must be balanced out among all. It must be made accessible to *all*, as it was before."   
"What?!" she cried. "That's -- that's dangerous! There's no hierarchy anymore, nothing to protect against a renegade student! If anyone could swing lightsabers and crush tracheas" -- Anakin winced -- "there would be no rest in the galaxy! Luke -- he should be a guardian of the Force, teaching those who can use it responsibly, not to anything that has exists naturally and requires energy."   
"The Force is knowledge," Windu finished. "Should it be limited to few, or should it be available to all who want for it? Maybe a few will emerge more powerful. Like your father. Like your brother. *Like you.* And certainly the strong will be able to do simple things, like levitating objects, running a little faster, jumping a little higher, parrying and blocking to save oneself --"   
"Or racing pods," Qui-Gon added. "And speeder bikes."   
Windu continued, ignoring this. "--But left in the hands of few, knowledge is dangerous and potent. The Dark was able to overcome the Light by being held by two powerful, poorly-principled beings rather than ten-thousand average 'good guys.' We should not have had to separate the two of you; the ability to hunt someone down like an animal, or read into their thoughts, from halfway across the galaxy -- that's not how the Force should be used. Shields, sensing people, sending 'images' -- it was all foolishness. It became -- and could again become -- a game, Leia. In all honesty, Jedi were peacemakers; somewhere, we became advocates of holy wars. It was the grand Game, between the Gods and the Mortals. No-one in this room is a god. A Jedi does not crave adventure, nor the glory of power."   
"Even with my help, Luke can't train everyone."   
"We're not speaking of training," Anakin corrected her. "The greatest wealth, once dispursed, seems less, and has less power. The Force flows through everything and everyone. Some are naturally more talented than others. There are Force-sensitives all around you; Solo, for one. But this time, dispel the myths. Eliminate the Order. Don't let your brother rebuild the Jedi as they were. *Everyone* should be Jedi in the sense that they understand the power of the Force. For too long it was kept from them, to the point where the Force can be written off as magician's tricks. This proved advantageous to Palpatine, and this must be avoided. Something new should emerge from this final purging."   
A silence built among the one living and the many dead.   
After a pause, she spoke. "Why me? Why didn't you tell Luke?"   
"You could say I gave you chores," Anakin continued. "You couldn't handle Luke's, and Luke couldn't handle yours. You are responsible for delivering to each other what I asked. Now ... wake."   
Finding herself staring Han in the eyes didn't help to ease her confusion.   
"We have to go to Naboo," she managed, the full weight of what had just happened crushing her, while, at the same time, the distance between that place and the here-and-now made it less real.   
"No place I'd rather be," was his curt reply, and then he was in front of the controls again.   
Somewhere, she feared that she'd spoken aloud in her sleep, or that something else had happened for him to suspect the truth. She couldn't focus on that, though; Han would tell her, try to laugh it off as ridiculous ... wouldn't he?   
The only thought that ran through Leia's mind was that, although an i'ealtu dragon may be able to change her skin from yellow to green, the blood still ran both ways with and without nitrogen-3.   
Then she remembered that that blood was in *her.*


End file.
